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Friday, July 27, 2012

Welcome to theToolkit
for Veteran Friendly Institutions. Created by the American
Council on Education (ACE), this online resource is designed to help
institutions of higher education build effective programs for veteran students
and share information. It highlights a variety of best practices and includes
video clips, profiles of student veterans programs across the U.S., and a searchable
database of tools and resources. http://vetfriendlytoolkit.org/

Students at Columbia Basin College unveil a new rescue sled today to be used at this weekend's Columbia Cup. A group of about 30 students from the college's welding department spent the last year building the sled.
KNDU TV, July 26, 2012

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Potential “disruptions” to higher education typically portend a diminished
role for the academy in workforce training, as students ditch college for, well,
something else. But one of the most promising alternative credentialing
movements – the manufacturing industry’s system of stackable certificates –
has actually led to a deeper, more symbiotic relationship between employers and
colleges.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

If you've been using tips and links from Renton Technical College's Faculty Focus, you will be interested in another great resource they're sharing: RAT Tracks. RAT Tracks is found in the RTC LibGuide, "...a wonderful resource for folks interested in learning more about WestEd’s Reading Apprenticeship framework."

From Debbie Crumb, RTC Instructional Librarian...

You can access all of the issues
via the LibGuide that we created at http://libguides.rtc.edu/rats and click on the tab for RA
& RATs at RTC. On that page under the video of Liz Falconer talking
about Michele Lesmeister and RA, you will find a box called RTC Publications
about RA and RATs. In that box are links to the RAT Tracks
newsletter, the READ posters we created that feature our students and staff and
our older newsletter the RAT Review.

Or at that same LibGuide, you
can click on tab for RA Routines & Topics and then select a specific
routine such as Think-Aloud and it will have a link to the RAT
Tracks issue about using Think-Alouds in the classroom. Many of the
routines have some great videos and ready-to-use templates created by Michele
Lesmeister.

The RATs LibGuide is a wonderful
resource for folks interested in learning more about WestEd’s Reading
Apprenticeship framework – again I think Michele’s videos and templates, coupled
with her RAT Tracks issues, are especially helpful because it makes
Reading Apprenticeship very real and do-able in the classroom. We have had
2,507 hits on the RATs LibGuide since January 1, 2012 – it’s the most used of
all the Library’s LibGuides.

You can also access all the
copies via our RATs website at http://rtc-rats.org and then click on link for RA at
RTC, and then on the link for RAT Tracks: Routines and Tips
Sheets

The Washington State eLearning Community will
meet today, as most Thursdays at 1 Pacific Time, via Bb Collaborate. The topic today
will be strategies for managing communication in Canvas. Scott Dennis, SBCTC eLearning Professional Development Manager, will give a short
presentation and demo and then facilitate an open discussion about anything else people are
interested in, although he's guessing the topic will mainly be Canvas focused as that
has been the recent trend. Topics will include setting communication channels
and preferences, managing the course activity stream, chat, and
conferencing.

Thirty-one of the thirty-four Washington State Community and Technical Colleges responded to a recent survey, describing the current status of use of mobile technology with their students and staff.
See what they had to say...http://tinyurl.com/WAmobileapps

Launched in 2008 by NSDC and a team of researchers from the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE), the three-part Status of Professional Learning research study aims to measure the effectiveness of professional learning in the United States. Funding for the multiyear research effort comes from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Just released: Building a Learning Community: A Tale of Two Schools

In an effort to understand and document the elements that make professional learning communities effective, a new report presents case studies of two schools drawn from survey data of 33 New Jersey public schools involved in a state-sponsored professional learning community training program. The report, Building a Learning Community: A Tale of Two Schools, is authored by Dan Mindich and Ann Lieberman and produced through Learning Forward and the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE). Among the key findings: sustaining focus is vital, collegiality is not enough, and leadership is key. This is the final report from the multiphase research initiative, Status of Professional Learning.

Although this report focuses on Latina/Latino students, the concept of faculty as Institutional Agents is applicable to support for all students. And, of course, the concept of faculty as empowerment agents is not new. (See Sumun Pendakur, 2011; and Stanton-Salazar 2010)

From the Center for Urban Education:

The Center for Urban Education (CUE) has released a new report titled "Developing the Capacity of Faculty to Become Institutional Agents for Latinos in STEM" authored by Professors Estela Mara Bensimon and Alicia C. Dowd, who co-direct the Center for Urban Education (CUE). The report, fifth in a series of CUE reports from a research study funded by the National Science Foundation, demonstrates the role faculty and administrators at four-year institutions can play in increasing Latina and Latino participation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Read the full report...

On June 27, 2012, the Honourable Glen Murray, Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities released a discussion paper titled Strengthening Ontario's Centres of Creativity, Innovation and Knowledge (Strengthening) on ideas for post-secondary education in Ontario. Strengthening calls for no less than transformation of post-secondary education in Ontario and is bound to trigger sector-wide thinking, dialogue, and action.

By equating our college and university sectors as Ontario’s centres of creativity, innovation, and knowledge, Strengthening pays our 24 public colleges and 20 public universities the high compliment they are indeed due...

The big question is whether the changes that will unfold will be changes of our choosing, or accidents that are the unintended consequences of technology disruption in a strategic vacuum.

Let’s set the stage for a forward discussion by putting forth the proposition that following five concurrent phenomena are now disrupting post-secondary education and will, in our opinion, lead to transformational change.
If this is true, the big question is whether the changes that will unfold will be of our choosing, or accidents that are the unintended consequences of technology disruption in a strategic vacuum....

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

When I met Martin Bean several years ago, I fell under his spell. Seriously. This guy is incredibly charismatic and committed to excellence and opportunities in education. He is now the Vice Chancellor of Open University in the UK. Watch him on video...

Liz and John Falconer of Renton Technical College created the video - even writing and performing the accompanying music - and have entered the video in a contest, "Why Open Matters." If you'd like to vote for their video, please do so today - the contest ends tomorrow.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Yes, as of July 1, the Washington State Community and Technical College system does have a signed contract with our new learning management system provider - Canvas!

No, you can't just jump right in and begin teaching in it...a bit (actually a lot!) of behind the scenes work is being done to get everything ready for us. And, of course, our SBCTC eLearning team is developing training for us.

In the mean time...Canvas does have a free open coursethat covers the ‘how’ of using Canvas. So, you eager beavers can dive right in and begin exploring on your own!

This event is free and open to the public. The discussion will focus on:

The fundamental role of a college education in advancing our nation's economic and social prosperity

The return on investing in post-secondary education

The shared responsibility of students, post-secondary institutions, state governments and the federal government in expanding post-secondary opportunity.

Under Secretary Kanter will be joined onstage by UW Provost Ana Mari Cauce, Washington State Senator Ed Murray, Seattle Times Publisher and CEO Frank Blethen, and Nancy Truitt Pierce, CEO of Woods Creek Consulting Company and a former Everett Community College trustee.

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

The amount of funding per FLC and the number of FLCs we can fund is yet to be determined. As we tally up what funds we have left after all of this year's grant recipients have been reimbursed for expenses, we will soon know what funds we can use for next year.

Former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates was the keynote speaker at a recent Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (APLU) event, marking the upcoming 150th anniversary of the Morrill Act.
President Lincoln signed the legislation into law back on July 2, 1862, established funding for public colleges and universities through federal land grants.

Gates, through his Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, has become a leading voice in education reform. His foundation supports educational programs at all levels. Gates encouraged university presidents to innovate to meet the needs of today's college students.